Senior Fellows

David Plouffe and Steve Schmidt discussed the 2012 election during a National Agenda “Road to the Presidency” presentation in November 2012.

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Delaware native David Plouffe (AS '10) left University of Delaware
before graduating to begin a career in politics. He served as President
Barack Obama’s campaign manager in 2008, helping steer
victories over Hillary Clinton for the nomination and John McCain for
the White
House, and later became senior adviser to the president. Plouffe is now a
University of Delaware graduate, having received his bachelor’s degree
in 2010. He is chief advisor and board member of Uber and also serves on
the board of the Barack Obama
Foundation.

Plouffe and his fellow UD alumni Vice President Joe
Biden (AS ’65) and Steve Schmidt (AS '13), who led the John McCain's
2008 campaign, inspired Bloomberg News to call University of Delaware
the academic epicenter of national politics in 2008.

Plouffe has managed campaigns at all levels of
politics, served as an award-winning producer of television
advertisements, served as a consultant to leading Fortune 500 companies
and has been a ubiquitous presence on national news shows.

In 2010, Plouffe was number four on Newsweek’s list of “New Thought Leaders,” and The Daily Beast named him as one of the “25 Smartest People of the Decade.” GQ named Plouffe in 2012 the third most powerful person in Washington.

Plouffe is the author of The New York Times best seller, The Audacity to Win: The Inside Story and Lessons of Barack Obama’s Historic Victory and has been a contributor for ABC News and Bloomberg Television. In 2013, he was inducted into The American Association of Political Consultants’ Hall of Fame.

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Steve Schmidt

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​Steve Schmidt joined David Plouffe for a post-election analysis in November 2012.

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Steve
Schmidt (AS '13) is one of the premier public affairs and campaign
strategists in the country. Schmidt has worked on numerous high-profile political
campaigns, most notably managing daily operations of John McCain's 2008
presidential campaign.

Before that he worked on
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s 2006 re-election campaign as campaign
manager. He has been the Communications Director for the National
Republican Congressional Committee. He has also served as a member of
the senior strategic planning group that ran the George W. Bush
re-election campaign. He also served as the White House strategist for
the Supreme Court nominations of Justice Samuel Alito and Chief Justice
John Roberts.

Schmidt and his fellow UD alumni Vice President Joe
Biden (AS ’65) and David Plouffe (AS '10), who led President Barack Obama's
2008 campaign, inspired Bloomberg News to call University of Delaware
the academic epicenter of national politics in 2008.

Steve
Schmidt attended University of Delaware from 1988 to 1993, where he
majored in political science. He left UD one math class short of
graduation, but then completed the three-credit course in 2013. He went
on to graduate and deliver the convocation address to his fellow
graduates.

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Domenico Montanaro

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​​​Domenico Montanaro speaking as part of National Agenda's "Road to the Presidency" series in 2016.

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​​Domenico Montanaro (AS '01) is the National Public Radio (NPR) lead editor for politics and digital audience. Montanaro earned a bachelor's degree in English from the University of Delaware in 2001 and a master's degree in journalism from Columbia University in 2007. Based in Washington, D.C., he directs political coverage across the network's broadcast and digital platforms.

Before joining NPR in 2015, Montanaro served as political director for politics and law at PBS NewsHour. He led domestic political and legal coverage, which included the 2014 midterm elections, the Supreme Court, and the unrest in Ferguson, Missouri. Prior to PBS NewsHour, Montanaro was deputy political editor at NBC News, where he covered two presidential elections and reported and edited for the network's political blog, "First Read."